In late 2019 I started to think about a new series of work called “What You Seek.” At my core I consider myself a storyteller but I’ve always used my paints and my camera rather than words to express myself. Through my work I’ve studied the concept of excavation and discovery and I’m interested in the theme of growth and evolution and these are the ideas that I was thinking about when I set out to create this new body of work. Using the contrast between warm and cool colors, as well as heavy layers and texture, I set out to explore what this meant for me.
Journaling is a huge part of my creative process. I wrote the following about this work on January 7, 2020: “‘This Must Be the Place’ is a painting about feeling at home. It’s about coming into your own and letting happiness find you rather than constantly searching for it. As an artist, my aesthetic isn’t a planned one. I just know when things feel right. I am always striving to paint moments that cannot be adequately described with words and that challenge me with endless questions that continue to build over time - feelings of belonging, struggle, fear, safety, pleasure, conflict - aspects of reality that cannot bc fully articulated through language. Abstraction feels liberating. There’s no fixed narrative so the story can change at any moment and that’s ok. I like this story and this moment of coming into my own and feeling at home physically where I am and within myself.”
What’s fascinating to me is that these words came about pre-Covid and quarantine. These days I think we all have defined for ourselves what feeling “home” means and I love that this painting, my first completed piece in 2020 and my last completed piece pre-Covid, is the one I made before everything changed. I look at this painting now and I can imagine how the world felt to me in that moment - open, exciting and ripe for the picking. In many ways I still think that it is and this work will forever commemorate that moment in time when everything was possible because the place and happiness found me.
This work is sold but you can see more of this collection here. A selection of my work is also available for sale on Singulart.
All photos in this post by Federico Photography.
